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Phil Tufnell
Portrait of Phil Tufnell

Philip Clive Roderick Tufnell

Born: 29 April 1966, Barnet, Hertfordshire
Major Teams: Middlesex, England.
Known As: Phil Tufnell
Batting Style: Right Hand Bat
Bowling Style: Slow Left Arm Orthodox


Test Debut: England v Australia at Melbourne, 2nd Test, 1990/91
Latest Test:
England v Australia at The Oval, 5th Test, 2001

ODI Debut:
England v New Zealand at Perth, World Series, 1990/91
Latest ODI:
England v New Zealand at Christchurch, 1st ODI, 1996/97

Career Statistics:

TESTS
 (including 23/08/2001)
                      M    I  NO  Runs   HS     Ave     SR 100  50   Ct  St
Batting & Fielding   42   59  29   153   22*   5.10  22.17   0   0   12   0

                      O      M     R    W    Ave   BBI    5  10    SR  Econ
Bowling            1881.2  505  4560  121  37.68  7-47    5   2  93.2  2.42

ONE-DAY INTERNATIONALS
 (including 20/02/1997)
                      M    I  NO  Runs   HS     Ave     SR 100  50   Ct  St
Batting & Fielding   20   10   9    15    5*  15.00  48.38   0   0    4   0

                      O      M     R    W    Ave   BBI   4w  5w    SR  Econ
Bowling             170     12   699   19  36.78  4-22    1   0  53.6  4.11

FIRST-CLASS
 (1986 - 2002)
                      M    I  NO  Runs   HS     Ave 100  50   Ct  St
Batting & Fielding  316  349 136  2066   67*   9.69   0   1  106   0

                      O      M     R    W    Ave   BBI    5  10    SR  Econ
Bowling            12822. 3489 31026 1057  29.35  8-29   53   6  72.7  2.41

LIST A LIMITED OVERS
 (1988 - 2001)
                      M    I  NO  Runs   HS     Ave 100  50   Ct  St
Batting & Fielding   93   36  22   125   18    8.92   0   0   17   0

                      O       R    W    Ave   BBI   4w  5w    SR  Econ
Bowling             777.1  3327  103  32.30  5-28    4   1  45.2  4.28

- Explanations of First-Class and List A status courtesy of the ACS.


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Book
What Now? The Autobiography - buy online from CricShop
A left-arm orthodox spinner of great talent, Phil Tufnell has had a patchwork career, marked by moments of greatness, but often failing to find favour with the selectors, despite being one of the few spinners in the English game who can single-handedly win matches.

Tufnell's greatest gift is that of flight, bowling to perfection the classic slow left armer's delivery that curls into the batsman and dips. As he has matured he has become more accurate, and he varies his pace cleverly. His run up is long for a spinner, and idiosyncratic. Starting with the ball in his right hand, he throws himself a catch to his left hand in the first two paces, after which he makes the third stride a hop on his left foot before approaching the wicket conventionally.

At times Tufnell resorts to containment by bowling wide of the leg stump from over the wicket, but he takes more wickets with a conventional approach. His nickname "The Cat" refers to his propensity for sleeping whenever the opportunity arises, rather than any feline tendencies in the field. He has had a deserved reputation as a weak fielder, but over time has improved to the point where he can occasionally pull off quite startling catches and stops. His batting is ineffective, showing a distinct dislike for any hostile bowling above medium pace, and he is normally placed eleven in the order.

First picked for England on the 1990-91 Ashes tour, Tufnell made his mark in his second Test by taking 5/65, but he has never established himself in the England side. Much-publicised domestic difficulties, resulting in a court appearance, did little to dispel rumours of a difficult temperament in his younger days at Middlesex. He was even known deliberately to bowl leg-side long-hops when not given the field setting he asked for.

On his day, Tufnell blends aggression, patience and guile to take wickets, and even on a non-turning wicket can be relied upon to hold an end down for most of a session. On a "raging bunsen" he can be unplayable. He has matured with age, both on and off the field, and his omission from the 1998-99 Ashes party, when he was clearly the best spinner in England, was a puzzle to many. If the national selectors continually overlooked him, he did win the attention of international selectors to be chosen for a Rest of the World XI to play an Asian XI in a one-day match in Dhaka. In something of a microcosm of his career, he managed to put down both Sachin Tendulkar and Saurav Ganguly off his own bowling before getting them both out.

Tufnell continued to enhance his reputation as the best spinner in the domestic game, and in the 2001 season he went past the 1,000 first-class wickets mark as he took exactly 60 at no more than 28.68 each. At the end of the season, he was still 23 runs short of reaching 2,000 in first-class cricket, despite going out to bat on 334 occasions!

Tufnell was never going to get a recall to the England side to fill an all-rounder's role, but his bowling was such that he forced his way back into the Test team to face the Australians at The Oval at the end of the Ashes series. On a flat pitch and against an outstanding batting line-up, his figures disappointed his army of fans; he took one wicket for 174 in his 39 overs. To be fair he bowled better than those figures would indicate, but it was not enough to gain him selection in the winter touring parties.

Tufnell continued to bowl with craft and control in the domestic game and helped Middlesex to promotion from the second division of the county championship with 45 wickets, to say nothing of a disciplinary warning when he unwisely reacted to a long, hot, frustrating day in the field. And he finally went past the 2,000 run mark - even if an innings of 45 failed to lift his career average above ten. (Copyright CricInfo October 2002)


Portrait photograph by Paul Sturgess,
Copyright Sportsline Photographic +44 (0)1455 273320,
Thanks to The Cricketer.

* Last Updated: Saturday, 09-Nov-2002 07:38:00 GMT


 
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